In a new survey highlighting the issue of ‘workplace bullying’, Drake International surveyed 800 Australia-wide employees and found that more than 50 per cent had claimed to have witnessed ‘bullying’ behaviour in the past twelve months, while a quarter said they had been a target of bullying in the workplace.

The Drake research has revealed that 56% of employees have personally witnessed workplace bullying in their organisation within the past 12 months and 60% of employees who have been bullied felt their company did not deal with the situation effectively with 30% of bullying targets and 50% of witnesses unhappy with the way their organisation had handled incidents of bullying.  ‘Downwards’ bullying from managers or supervisors was reported in around 5% of the cases, with a further 25% experiencing ‘sidewards’ bullying from workmates and colleagues.

Organisations need to understand bullying and how to build organisational resilience to it. Workers Compensation claims for bullying are on-the increase and on average cost twice as much as physical claims.  Bullying can also lead to reduced efficiency, increased absenteeism and poor team morale, loss of reputation & public face and even civil & legal action.  The problem is such that bullying is specifically mentioned as a psychological hazard in the workplace therefore organisations' must control or eliminate bullying as part of their OH&S duty of care.      

Click here to access the full survey results.